From January 12-16, 2025, the Southlake Fire Department will be hosting an Accreditation Assessment Team from the Center for Public Safety Excellence/Commission on Fire Accreditation International (CPSE/CFAI). This team will be composed of four peer assessors from other Fire Departments throughout the country.

The accreditation process is a means of establishing industry-wide measures to determine and evaluate the level of overall organizational performance. Once every five years, the Fire Department is required to go through an on-site peer assessment to determine the departments’ ongoing compliance with 11 main categories. Contained within the 10th edition FESSAM categories are 46 criterions, each of which is further broken down into 250 detailed performance indicators. The result creates what is known as the “self-assessment manual” for fire services.

The assessment will be conducted at our FD Headquarters with the Fire Chief's Conference Room serving as the primary file validation and verification location. Assessors will start arriving on Sunday, January 12, 2025, and depart by the afternoon of Thursday, January 16, 2025. In addition to file validation and verification, the assessors will be conducting interviews, tours of our city, facilities, and mutual aid locations.

The Fire Department is looking forward to hopefully receiving a recommendation of reaccreditation by the peer assessment team for its 5th five-year term.

This week, four assessors from the Center for Public Safety Excellence/Commission on Fire Accreditation International (CPSE/CFAI) were onsite to review the Southlake Fire Department for re-accreditation.

The process to verify and validate the department’s ability to comply with 10 major categories occurs every five years.  The Southlake Fire Department is one of only 12 fire departments in Texas accredited through CPSE.

The department maintains its accreditation status as part of the City’s overall commitment to set world-class standards and exceed expectations.

“We hold ourselves to the highest possible performance standards with a strict application of code and regulation and employ the highest trained and accredited professionals to serve this wonderful community,” City of Southlake Fire Chief Michael Starr said. “Gaining accreditation through CPSE/CFAI is proof of our dedication to be the best and provide superior service when protecting Southlake.”

According to CPSE’s website, there are only 270 accredited agencies, including the U.S. Department of Defense. The accreditation process establishes industry-wide performance measures to determine and evaluate the level of overall organizational performance and requires an onsite peer assessment to conduct interviews, validate files and review equipment.

The City is proud to raise the standard for fire departments around the world, deliver excellence and go above and beyond in our commitment to Southlake.